Fire Emblem, The exo-shade
by oddchoice
Summary: First came the Gohsts, and then the return of the Warrior King, Marth, now from beyond the edge of the World comes a a froce threatening to destroy to destroy all worlds. The fate of the whole wolrd weighs on the shoulders of Arthur, Merlin and Robert.
1. Chapter 1

Arthur emerged from the barracks with his pike into the parade-ground. He was marching with the rest of his platoon; they lined in front of the sergeant and prepared for parade.

"Squaaaad, attention!" ordered Sergeant Tarkus.

The Squad snapped to attention in the cold morning air.

"Present arms!"

The soldiers presented their arms for inspection.

"Very good, good, very good," said sergeant Tarkus as he walked down the line, inspecting the turn out of the men. Private Scrubs was the only one to have not reached a standard of presentation Tarkus deemed suitable, a regular occurrence for Scrubs, and he was given an ear bashing for it.

"Listen here men;" ordered the Sergeant "We've been getting reports of strange sightings on the Isle of Fog, fisherman and merchants reporting sightings of ghosts. Obviously I don't believe in such foolishness, but it could be that a band of pirates or brigands has set up there, and we can't be having that, so today we'll be heading off to go have a look around, you've got an hour to go to the mess hall and pack yourselves a lunch and then I want you to report to dock at quarter passed seven, squad dismissed." Sergeant Tarkus turned and marched off, and the men turned to head to the mess hall.

"Scrubs, you need to smarten up a bit mate," joked Arthur as they marched to the mess hall "At this rate you'll never make sergeant."

"That's easy for you to say Arthur," began Scrubs "you're so great with at fighting with swords and pikes, and you're not just good at fighting, you can march further than any of us, including the Sergeant, and you're the best at making those make-shift shelters we sleep in when we're out on manoeuvres."

"Yeah but I'm such a lousy cook, I almost gave everyone food poisoning last time I cooked, we were only saved because you realised that those berries were the poisonous ones."

"I'm a soldier not a chef, if that's the best thing you can find to say about me then I might as well give up."

"Don't be so hard on yourself Scrubs, and don't let Tarkus's criticisms get to you either, he just does it to help you get better."

"Hmmm, nah I think he just doesn't like me."

"That's nonsense, he acts all stern but he likes us all secretly."

"Not as much as you like Guinevere," teased Scrubs.

"Oh shut up," said Arthur, playfully pushing Scrubs.

Guinevere was a girl who looked after the horses in the stables; she was kind and clever, and very pretty, with dark hair and green eyes.

Scrubs laughed as Arthur started to blush, "It's it's ok, anyway, I think she likes you back."

"Seriously?"

"Oh yes, look, if she brings the sergeants horse down to the dock today just watch, I bet you any money that she takes a quick glance at you."

"Errm ok," said Arthur uncertainly as thwy entered the mess hall, "yeah I'll do that."

The squad met down at the dock, all fifteen of them stood in three ranks with their packed lunches in bags strapped onto their back.

Sergeant Tarkus walked to the front of the squad and ordered the men to attention. "Listen here men, when we reach the island I want be A group to head to the east side of the island and search there, B group should cover the west side and the beach, that leaves C group to come with me up to the hill to search the ruins for bandits. If any group finds bandits or brigands, I want you to send two men off to go and get the other groups for back up, meanwhile the three men in the group just weight where you are until I join you, and then await my instructions. Remember, the Isle of Fog has it's name for a reason, visibility is very poor out there, so I unless your sending for reinforcements I want you to all stay together... Understood men?"

"Understood sir," chorused the men.

They heard the sound of a horse, and turned to watch as Guinevere approached with the Segeant's horse Rodney.

She handed the reins of Rodney over to Sergeant, and then sure enough quickly glanced over at Arthur before heading back to the stables.

Several of the men watched her leave, she really was very pretty.

Sergeant Tarkus led Rodney onto the boat and then turned to the men and said "Squad, embark."

The men embarked onto the boat and the Sergeant Tarkus said "It's a fair way to the Island and there's no wind today so we'll a have to row, Arthur, Scrubs, Hancock, John, James, Davis, you'll row as far as Beale's rock, after that I want Haines, Parker, Ryan, Nathan, Aiden and Oscar to row us the rest of the way, understood?"

"Yes sir," chorused the men, "Then off we go."

Arthur was a soldier in the Haffinian army. Haffin was a small country on the southern edge of the Northern continent. Their ruler was a young King named Harrald, who was slightly unsure of himself as a ruler, but an excellent swordsman, having bested several of the continents best duellists.

The Isle of Fog was a small Island several miles off of the south coast of Haffin, near it's easterly border, with Jondland. As the name would suggest it was perpetually fogbound, and it was also uninhabited, with nothing to see there other than the ruins of some old castle or temple which was so old that even the earliest written accounts of the isle describe it as just an eerie ruin.

Sergeant Tarkus's squad landed on the isle, and split into their three groups, Arthur and Scrubs being in Group A went east.


	2. Chapter 2, The Gohsts

The fog was thicker than usual today on the isle, and Arthur could barely see further than a few feet in front of him. All was quiet as Arthur and his men headed East up the slight incline, there didn't appear to be any life on the island save for the grass, trees and shrubs that grew from within the cracks in what remained of the ruins on the island.

Mostly the structure that had been here, whatever it had been, was completely gone, but all over the island there was the occasional wall, some pillars, several statues whose forms had faded over the years, and even a few arches. At the very crest of the hill was the most complete part of the structure, a room of some description, the roof had caved in centuries ago and the stone floor was almost gone, and save for some rubble there was nothing in it.

The stillness of the isle was starting to get to the men as group A neared the end of their sweep, reaching the Eastern cliff, which looked down upon the beach. Even at this short distance the sea was virtually silent, and there seemed to be no wind either, it was the fog, it seemed to just suppress everything and enforce a deathly, chill stillness on the world.

"I think I hear something," said Ryan.

"Oh don't start this, Ryan, you'll just get people's nerves on edge," replied Arthur.

"Wait no," said Scrubs "I think I hear someone down on the beach"

"Hello down there!" called Arthur.

"Arthur is that you and your group up there?" replied a voice from down on the beach.

"Yes it is, anything to report?"

"Yes, there's a small sailing boat moored here, looks only big enough for one or two people, nobody on board,"

"Ok,"

Then, through the fog, Arthur heard the a cry "Is that group A?"

"Yes it is," replied Arthur, "And group B, what is it, trouble?"

"yes, up o the hill," replied the voice "There are ghosts on this island we were attacked up in ruins on top of the hill!"

"Alright," called out Arthur, already preparing for the battle ahead, "We're coming."

The groups raced up the hill, towards the sound of fighting.

"This is A and B group," called Arthur, could hear that his comrades were cloase, but due to the damnable fog he couldn't see them anywhere.

"Over here, called a voice, Arthur believed to be Parker, "Me, Aiden and Nathan are here, Nathan's seriously injured and the Serge is missing, we sent the other two looking for you."

"Yeah," replied Arthur leading his men towards the others "Haines found us, we don't know where John is, probably searching for B group down in the West, never mind we don't have time to go looking for him.

Groups and B reached up with the three men from Group C, and then Arthur said decisively, "we need to stick together, Haines and Parker, you carry Aiden, everyone else, form a ring around those three just like we've been trained to, if anything comes near us we skewer it, now which way did the Sergeant go?"

"That way," said Parker pointing towards the very top of the Hill.

"Then we'll move slowly...Aagh!" started Arthur, as being charged out of the fog at him. It was white and cloudy in colour, but had the shape of a man, it took a swipe at Arthur with it's axe, but Arthur ducked under it, and then stabbed the apparition with his pike; it faded into nothingness.

Maybe they really were under attack by ghosts, but it didn't matter to Arthur weather the foe he faced right now was physical or spiritual ij nature, if it could be killed with his pike then it made no immediate difference.

"As I was saying, we go steadily that way, then when we've found the Sergeant we head back down the hill."

The squad moved in the direction they'd seen Tarkus head off in, they were attacked by several more... ghost, but each one was felled without incident, now in formation, the squad could robustly defend itself.

They reached the top of the hill, and still there was still no sign of Sergeant Tarkus.

"He must have headed towards that room place," said Scrubs.

"Good thinking Scrubs," said Arthur and they headed towards the room at the top of the Hill. "Sergeant Tarkus where are you?" called out Arthur.

"I'm over here, there's too many of them!" replied a faint voice in the distance.

"You were right Scrubs," said Arthur, as they moved towards the room. However they quickly came up against heavy resistance.

Gohst after ghost came at the squad, and in increasing numbers as they drew closer to the room, Arthur realised that unless they acted quickly they'd be too late to reach Tarkus. He saw an opening and took it, ducking under a wild swing of one of the ghost's axes, he charged past the ghost and onwards towards the room. Arthur dodged past four more ghosts as he made towards the room, and then when he was close he narrowly avoided a bolt of lightning magic aimed his way.

This was strange, he thought, as up until now all the ghosts had used only axes and swords, but as he drew closer he saw that it was not a ghost but an actual man, standing in the doorway.

A mage by the look of him, and reasonably skilled too, judging by the way he blasted at the ghosts with his magic.

"Are you a member of the Haffinian army?" he called out to Arthur as he saw him approaching, "I'm so glad that you're here, there's a man inside he's injured and I can't hold these things off much longer!"

"Right," said Arthur.

He entered the room, i was small and cold, and it was hard to see anything in the fog, but what he could make out on the ground was the shape of sergeant Tarkus, unconscious.

"Aww damn it," called Arthur to the mage, "He's unconscious, and I can't move him in all of this armour."

"then what do we do?" asked the mage, now starting t panic, there's too many of..." he was cut short by a blinding flash of light

There was a moment of silence and blindness.

And then when his vision returned to normal, Arthur could see that the fog was gone, and the ghosts along with it.

He breathed a sigh of relief, and then spotted another figure standing a short ways away.

He was tall, with blue hair and he wore a blue cloak, and in his right hand was a sword raised high into the air.

He turned around and walked smartly towards the room where Arthur, the mage, and Sergeant Tarkus were.

"Greetings," he said "i am the warrior king of legend, I am Marth."


End file.
